Apart from MOT time, the visible high beam LED might get you a fail.
TransporterHQ (THQ) Aftermarket Headlights
Apart from MOT time, the visible high beam LED might get you a fail.
Sam Lawson
Member
Well there is that, but as you can see from my plates, my MOT garage are nice people. It’s also not sue for another 2 years on that one as it’s a 2017.
LED lights without auto leveling are illegal aren't they? All the H7 and H1 LED lights i've seen state on the packaging that they are for offroad use only???
Sam Lawson
Member
As I've said on another post asking the same thing.. Yes you're right, it states on the box that they are for 'offroad use only', however they are about as illegal as mis-spaced number plates, so the only time that it might become an issue is MOT time. My MOT isn't due for 2 years, so i'll cross that bridge when i get to it, but as I've never had any issues with my number plate on previous cars, i doubt the lights will be an issue.
In the meantime, i can now see when driving at night, which in my books makes it a safer drive, without having to pay the £3k+ to have the VW solution fitted, which i would LOVE to have, but cannot justify that cost. They are dipped correctly so they do not dazzle oncoming traffic.
Which ones did you fit?
Sam Lawson
Member
Philips Ultinon H7
Incorrectly spaced number plates don't fry oncoming drivers' retinas though so would be considered somewhat trivial in comparison.
I'd also be wary going into print stating your testing station allows illegal number plates as it is very easy to trace it back to the tester and he/she won't thank you for that.
Sam Lawson
Member
It's OK, they have enough trouble counting to 10 to be worried about things like that
I have put the travelin-lite head lights in my van with the Philips led bulbs, when I turn the head lights on there is a bulb out light on dash after 3 mins or so if them being switched on, spoke to Elliot at traveling-lite he sent me a new loom which has been fitted the error light came on after about 10 mins of head lights being switched on, can’t work it out any ideas?
Modern Canbus systems do strange things when they see a different current in a circuit than expected. Providing the lights are working without any flashing, just look for a local VCDS user on the map and get them to disable the warning light (you actually tick the box to turn it on strangely enough).
Can you take a photo of the back of the light unit, I'm interested to see where they put the ballast (is it inside the unit or stuck to the housing).
As no-one else has replied to this.....from the information on the THQ website, my understanding was that they recommended not using 100W bulbs with their harness as it would overload the vehicle wiring. I'm presuming it takes the same vehicle feed and sends it to both bulbs without using a relay. As you have enabled both bulbs in VCDS, you have two separate feeds to the bulbs so would be in a better place to run both 100W bulbs however I did do some voltage drop tests which would suggest you are better off sticking with stock rated bulbs (I think I put the results earlier in this thread somewhere).
Regarding LED bulbs, the huge cooling fins you see are to look after the light source which is very susceptible to heat. They also use less power than a standard bulb so should be fine for the stock wiring.
There's an interesting article here from autobulbsdirect
So are you saying I should revert back to standard headlight bulbs or is there bulbs that are better that won’t set of the bulb warning light, none of it makes sence to me, will using the current bulbs cause an issue going forward?
Is all that wiring for the light units? I can see a relay and some sort of controller/ballast in front of the battery and red wires running across the front of the engine bay. The Phillips units should come with a small matchbox sized aluminium box to run the LEDs.
The bulb warning is just because the vehicle electronics are seeing something different to what it expects (i.e. it expects to see 55w loading on dipped beam). Some aftermarket bulbs require 'canbus decoders' which is usually a large capacitor to stop flickering and bulb errors but for us, if it's just a bulb error and the lights are not flickering (you'd see them flashing similar to an emergency services vehicle), just get it changed in the VCDS coding. The Phillips LED bulbs are probably the best out there so if you're happy with the legal issues, just run them. At £140 a set I certainly wouldn't be putting them in the bin!
Thanks for your help im having the steering wheel changed soon so will get the guy to sort the coding thingy and take the light off, I will be speaking robelkiot again so will be interested to see what he says! With regard to MOT the bulbs might fail but the dipped beam going off when the high beam going on isn’t an issue as the dipped stays on when high beam is on.
The headlights look really good imo couldn’t get the genuine ones as spending a lot making the van into a campe, I agree the Philips headlight bulbs are very good, I’m not getting the flickering issue your talking about!
Did you get the vehicle coded to keep both lights on or is that an additional harness (it does look like another harness)? If not, you could get it coded properly and probably lose a lot of that wiring. At MoT time you're at the mercy of the tester. Although strictly speaking a fail, the tester may not realise it has LEDs fitted or even mistake it for having OEM LEDs fitted but there are obvious differences and irrespective of what Sam Lawson states above, they are usually very switched on people as they are trusted by the Government to identify unsafe vehicles. If I've ever had any concerns about anything at MoT time, I've spoken to the tester when I've booked it in a week before and asked for their advice.
No not had coded there plug and play what ever that means, I will have a word with the guy who is doing my steering wheel and get him to read some of your posts to see if he can do what your saying there is a lot or wiring behind each head light, as long as there safe to use as in won’t affect the vans electrics then I can live with the bulb warning light for a week or two until I get it in for the wheels change.
Thanks for your help!
The plug and play is an additional harness so you can lose that with VCDS coding. Also, next time you do get the light warning, double check the bulbs including indicators, number plate and brakes are actually all working. It could be a genuine fault somewhere else on the vehicle!
This is the issue with harnesses, coding and current.
The harness obviously splits the power of the main beam to supply the dipped also, this will then affect what the CANBUS see's. To me there is only one proper fix, Get rid of the harness and code the lights. The coding is so easy and quick. My VW 'specialist' charged me £20. Now the van's coded I won't ever have any issues with fake error lights.
All these bulbs that are LED and higher wattage will have different current draw which is what the CANBUS system monitors. If you fit LED's, then you need a resistor to beef up the current seen by the CANBUS system.
The harness obviously splits the power of the main beam to supply the dipped also, this will then affect what the CANBUS see's. To me there is only one proper fix, Get rid of the harness and code the lights. The coding is so easy and quick. My VW 'specialist' charged me £20. Now the van's coded I won't ever have any issues with fake error lights.
All these bulbs that are LED and higher wattage will have different current draw which is what the CANBUS system monitors. If you fit LED's, then you need a resistor to beef up the current seen by the CANBUS system.
